By suggestions I read here, I purchased a LSI 9240-8i SAS/SATA controller, which to my understanding is essentially the same as the IBM M1015. I have not yet installed the controller card but I've seen mentioned that the firmware ought to be changed to "LSI9211-IT" mode. I've searched for how to flash the firmware on the card but one problem I've found is from all the sources I've seen to download the flashing software, they all refer to the same location to download, on the LaptopVideo2Go forum to download a file called SAS2008.zip. The problem I have with following directions is I can not download that file... my computer starts, then times out. As I don't really know exactly what I'm doing, other than following instructions written by someone else, I was hoping to get a little more guidance from someone here, since this will be for my FreeNAS. Is it important to flash my firmware and if so, is there an alternate source other than where I have listed?
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LSI 9240-8i firmware
- Thread starter RonRN18
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http://www.servethehome.com/ibm-serveraid-m1015-part-4/
Your mileage may vary and some steps may need to be done from the UEFI shell, namely the flashing proper.
Your mileage may vary and some steps may need to be done from the UEFI shell, namely the flashing proper.
mike tancsa
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Not sure about the IT mode, but I grabbed the latest firmware from the LSI website and flashed it using the mfiutil program on another FreeBSD box before using it on my FreeNAS box.
FreeNAS 9.3 sees it as
# mfiutil show adapter
mfi0 Adapter:
Product Name: LSI MegaRAID SAS 9240-8i
Serial Number: SP12147654
Firmware: 20.13.1-0208
RAID Levels: JBOD, RAID0, RAID1, RAID5, RAID10, RAID50
Battery Backup: not present
NVRAM: 32K
Onboard Memory: 0M
Minimum Stripe: 8k
Maximum Stripe: 64k
# mfiutil show drives
mfi0 Physical Drives:
0 ( 1863G) ONLINE <WDC WD2002FAEX-0 1D05 serial=WD-WCAY01286896> SATA E1:S3
1 ( 1863G) ONLINE <WDC WD2002FAEX-0 1D05 serial=WD-WCAY01287057> SATA E1:S2
2 ( 1863G) ONLINE <WDC WD2002FAEX-0 1D05 serial=WD-WCAY01292022> SATA E1:S0
3 ( 1863G) ONLINE <WDC WD2002FAEX-0 1D05 serial=WD-WCAY01291940> SATA E1:S1
5 ( 1863G) ONLINE <WDC WD2002FAEX-0 1D05 serial=WD-WCAY01286921> SATA E1:S5
6 ( 1863G) ONLINE <WDC WD2002FAEX-0 1D05 serial=WD-WCAY01291888> SATA E1:S4
Its quite easy to update the firmware via the mfiutil program.
The firmware file from LSI I used is
% md5 imr_fw.rom
MD5 (imr_fw.rom) = a3dc90b8fe67f0b6f3aa473dc6284186
4,456,448 bytes
FreeNAS 9.3 sees it as
# mfiutil show adapter
mfi0 Adapter:
Product Name: LSI MegaRAID SAS 9240-8i
Serial Number: SP12147654
Firmware: 20.13.1-0208
RAID Levels: JBOD, RAID0, RAID1, RAID5, RAID10, RAID50
Battery Backup: not present
NVRAM: 32K
Onboard Memory: 0M
Minimum Stripe: 8k
Maximum Stripe: 64k
# mfiutil show drives
mfi0 Physical Drives:
0 ( 1863G) ONLINE <WDC WD2002FAEX-0 1D05 serial=WD-WCAY01286896> SATA E1:S3
1 ( 1863G) ONLINE <WDC WD2002FAEX-0 1D05 serial=WD-WCAY01287057> SATA E1:S2
2 ( 1863G) ONLINE <WDC WD2002FAEX-0 1D05 serial=WD-WCAY01292022> SATA E1:S0
3 ( 1863G) ONLINE <WDC WD2002FAEX-0 1D05 serial=WD-WCAY01291940> SATA E1:S1
5 ( 1863G) ONLINE <WDC WD2002FAEX-0 1D05 serial=WD-WCAY01286921> SATA E1:S5
6 ( 1863G) ONLINE <WDC WD2002FAEX-0 1D05 serial=WD-WCAY01291888> SATA E1:S4
Its quite easy to update the firmware via the mfiutil program.
The firmware file from LSI I used is
% md5 imr_fw.rom
MD5 (imr_fw.rom) = a3dc90b8fe67f0b6f3aa473dc6284186
4,456,448 bytes
SweetAndLow
Sweet'NASty
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No! you should not be using firmware version 20. In pretty sure everyone using that version has lost there data. You need to be running the firmware version that matches your driver which is p16.
mike tancsa
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This is on an actual 9240-8i, or on the IBM cards ? Can you point the thread about data loss ? Searching for 20.13.1-0208 and freebsd doesnt show anything. On 9.3, the driver says its
mfi0: <Drake Skinny> port 0x5000-0x50ff mem 0xb1360000-0xb1363fff,0xb1300000-0xb133ffff irq 16 at device 0.0 on pci1
mfi0: Using MSI
mfi0: Megaraid SAS driver Ver 4.23
...
mfi0: 2323 (473523167s/0x0020/info) - Shutdown command received from host
mfi0: 2324 (boot + 3s/0x0020/info) - Firmware initialization started (PCI ID 0073/1000/9240/1000)
mfi0: 2325 (boot + 3s/0x0020/info) - Firmware version 2.130.404-3836
mfi0: 2326 (boot + 5s/0x0020/info) - Package version 20.13.1-0208
mfi0: 2327 (boot + 5s/0x0020/info) - Board Revision 04A
mfi0: <Drake Skinny> port 0x5000-0x50ff mem 0xb1360000-0xb1363fff,0xb1300000-0xb133ffff irq 16 at device 0.0 on pci1
mfi0: Using MSI
mfi0: Megaraid SAS driver Ver 4.23
...
mfi0: 2323 (473523167s/0x0020/info) - Shutdown command received from host
mfi0: 2324 (boot + 3s/0x0020/info) - Firmware initialization started (PCI ID 0073/1000/9240/1000)
mfi0: 2325 (boot + 3s/0x0020/info) - Firmware version 2.130.404-3836
mfi0: 2326 (boot + 5s/0x0020/info) - Package version 20.13.1-0208
mfi0: 2327 (boot + 5s/0x0020/info) - Board Revision 04A
Unfortunately you'll have to search for threads yourself. But there are dozens of cases with problems with mismatched drivers. From timeouts to pool loss. There is a REASON they put the prompt in 9.3 to warn of the mismatch. p20 seems to be the worst offender.
There is no IT firmware for the 9240. Supposedly it doesn't screw up and add a header in jbod mode, but you'd be a fool to trust it. You are running the mfi driver instead of the known good mps driver which treats the card as an hba. So treat it like an m1015 and crossflash it to a 9211-8i. Nobody goes through the hassle for fun, it is a necessary evil to protect your data.
There have been a bunch threads on firmware in the last month. I even posted a zip with all the tools, utils, and files ready to go not long ago. The 9240 and M1015 use the same instructions.
Good Luck.
There is no IT firmware for the 9240. Supposedly it doesn't screw up and add a header in jbod mode, but you'd be a fool to trust it. You are running the mfi driver instead of the known good mps driver which treats the card as an hba. So treat it like an m1015 and crossflash it to a 9211-8i. Nobody goes through the hassle for fun, it is a necessary evil to protect your data.
There have been a bunch threads on firmware in the last month. I even posted a zip with all the tools, utils, and files ready to go not long ago. The 9240 and M1015 use the same instructions.
Good Luck.
mike tancsa
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My card is an actual LSI branded 9240-8si. For my FreeNAS as well as the FreeBSD boxes I have used it on (9x, 10x) all probe it as mfi, not mps. The man pages imply mfi is the driver to use for the 9240 as well. I am using a stock FreeNAS 9.3 image, and it assigns the card the mfi driver. The warning seems to be only for the mps version of the driver no ? I dont see it in dmegs.boot of the FreeNAS box. I have a few of these cards deployed including on a busy RELENG_10 box (32TB) and havent had any issues with it since it went live in October. Monthly scrubs have not yielded errors, including last nights (scan: scrub repaired 0 in 12h26m with 0 errors on Mon Jan 12 08:45:50 2015). I use the mfip kld as well so as to see the drives through cam. 4TB drives with 4k sectors work as well.
0{backup4}# camcontrol identify da3 | grep "sector size"
sector size logical 512, physical 4096, offset 0
0{backup4}#
0{backup4}# camcontrol identify da3 | grep "sector size"
sector size logical 512, physical 4096, offset 0
0{backup4}#
I understand the hardware exactly. Branded LSI, M1015, rs2wc080... doesn't matter we want them all lobotomized into a dumb hba for zfs. It's a sas2008 chip no more no less.
It's your data, I'm only telling you what we've seen hundreds of times here. It's not a guess. It isn't because I said so. I HATE flashing hardware, but I still do it in this case. Could run for 6 months or a year perfectly. Took 4 months until I started seeing errors with a mismatch p14 to p16. Prior to that I would have said never flash unless you are addressing a specific problem.
It takes 5 minutes and could save you hours and hours, not to mention your data. That's it from me, you'll find a dozen other high level guys here that will tell you the same in numerous threads.
p.s The warning doesn't exist for 'mfi' because you shouldn't be using it.
It's your data, I'm only telling you what we've seen hundreds of times here. It's not a guess. It isn't because I said so. I HATE flashing hardware, but I still do it in this case. Could run for 6 months or a year perfectly. Took 4 months until I started seeing errors with a mismatch p14 to p16. Prior to that I would have said never flash unless you are addressing a specific problem.
It takes 5 minutes and could save you hours and hours, not to mention your data. That's it from me, you'll find a dozen other high level guys here that will tell you the same in numerous threads.
p.s The warning doesn't exist for 'mfi' because you shouldn't be using it.
You WIN!
Glorious1
Guru
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- Nov 23, 2014
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To the OP, not sure if you got it sorted. Turns out there are several ways to go about this. I have the same card and finally got it to work with this procedure:
https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/my-socket-2011v3-build.24842/page-2#post-163643
https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/my-socket-2011v3-build.24842/page-2#post-163643
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